Poems of Myself: 10/19/1955-10/19/2055

Directions

Let us walk for awhile. Bring along the pick ax, spade and knapsack hanging in the shed. You will find them on your right just inside the split barn door.

Walk through the trellis in the rear garden, it is the trailhead that leads through the forest. Be careful, there are roots to your left sticking up from the grade from an old pin oak—I don't want you to spill me, well, not yet.

Follow the trail until two paths merge, then stop. Take the pick and break up the hard pan. You will find ribbons of clay and sand. Mix them together with the shovel to create loam.

Add the ashes from the velvet bag that you will find inside the sack, this will improve the soil too. If you feel inclined to say something over my remains, then, that is fine, but it is not important, since you have done enough.

It will be spring soon. Already, you can hear the chickadees.


recycle day
a washed out worm
in the rain puddle


To Whom This May Concern

To whom this may concern:

While I watch the magistrate falter crumbling fields of reveriea halo of blackened clouds float overtures, where once a firefly flickered--Whose children taunt children killing children of Santee and Columbine Whose parents weaken gun control Whose parents leave gun unsupervised and obtainable Whose little girls abort and abandon babiesWhose parent's kill little girls in the name of righteousness,with there red panties and pink lipstick. Who carry picket signs of wordswritten by boredom,parading activists, and singing songs of saintly tunes. And in the melting mindsthat leap from tree to tree, building to building. In a haze of Crack, Angeldustic-ecstasy Where my mind went mad from fermented potato-mash,PCP, Rag, Jazz and Blues--Where blue skies once sailed endless from sea to sea. Shimmy in minds of the pretenders' Tangled in dreams and lovers. Who's shadow know the darkness of these concessions met by the mandate. Who cut trees, cut trees Who kill the ozone, kill the ozone. Who's world has withered, in this desecration abomination, of these the avian ... Who use petroleum base and plastics killing fish animal and man, Whose entre of atmosphere, enter our water, dissolving in our food, and destroys the sperm count of our youth. Whose artifical estrogen will conquer Nations. Yes, this is true! and the in saecula saeculorum of these songs: Birds do not sing for our ears! For whom a disease, monkey's developed,AIDS, have made the hetero shy, and the anus of a gay man sincere. Where Cholera showed in an Ocean City Bay, and What's killing the Brants in Forsythe? Where West-nile is strong enough to kill a horse Whose State sprays for Lyme disease-- Killing fish reptile and birds, Whose carcasses are devoured by raptors Who have endangered the Timber Rattler' Who keep building and building and to my wonderment...Where will we get water when all the Jersey spungs are dry... Am I barking at the moon? Whose moon is leaving the earth's grasp While environmentalist take the Utility dollar Who's consumers sponsor said pay offs'And are the main pollutant and fossil fuel user. Who write opinions on paper and glass, Tagging walls of steal and stone-- That no god would know, nor a poet would write. And to know the deaf ear can hearAnd to know the dumb tongue cans speak, Where they, the blind, need no eyes to see.

haiku

forty-six years
writing my name
yellow in snow

July 4th —
small talk over beer
with a redcoat

morning sun —
fish scales glisten
in the otter scat

shooting star —
father’s ring
slips off my finger

Indian summer
a bee bounces around
in the beer can

cancer ward--
a get-well balloon
in the trash

Berlin Wall
a smooth stone
in my pocket

quiet pond
a stone turning
in my palm

talk of devorce
two starlings
back to back

fishing
where my brother stood —
twilight chill

snowed in . . .
fire wraps
around a log